Archive for June 2015

Iran backs Taliban with cash and arms

06.12. 2015 – MarketWatch – By Margherita Stancati – KABUL – When Abdullah, a Taliban commander in central Afghanistan, needs more rifles and ammunition, he turns to the same people who pay his $580-a-month salary: his Iranian sponsors.

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America Letter: Journalist jailed for reporting on life in Iran

Washington Post journalist Jason Rezaian and his Iranian wife Yeganeh Salehi in Tehran in September 2013. Rezaian, a dual Iranian-American citizen, has been been jailed since July last year on charges including espionage. Photograph: EPA/STR

06.13.2015 – THE IRISH TIMES – Simon Carswell – Today is US-born ‘Washington Post’ correspondent Jason Rezaian’s 326th day in jail
Jason Rezaian’s article in the Washington Post on July 17th, 2014 was a charming colour feature about how a growing number of Iranians were embracing America’s favourite pastime, baseball.

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Activists and artists hit by new wave of harsh sentencing by Iran judiciary

Mostafa Azizi, a 53-year-old Iranian film-maker, producer and writer has been sentenced to eight years in jail. Photograph: Courtesy of family

06.12.2015 – theguardian – Saeed Kamali Dehghan Iran correspondent – Moderate president, Hassan Rouhani, has failed publically to speak out against sentences given out by Iran’s hardline judges
Iran’s judiciary has unleashed a wave of heavy jail sentences against artists and activists in what appears to be an attempt to send a warning to those who dare to express dissent.

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Raising visibility for journalists imprisoned by Iran

Journalist Maziar Bahari

June 12, 2015 – PBS – Journalist Maziar Bahari was held for months in a Tehran prison after being arrested while on assignment. He’s written a memoir of that ordeal, “Then They Came for Me,” plus directed a documentary called “Forced Confessions.” Now he’s launched a website that he’s hoping will draw more attention to the dangers facing journalists in Iran. Bahari discusses the project with William Brangham.

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